Karin Lowachee

I found "Warchild" because Tanya Huff recommended Karin Lowachee as one of her favourite science fiction writers. There's no audiobook version, the cover is depressingly generic and the title didn't speak to me. Normally I'd have moved on and then I'd have missed one of the most original, vivid and emotionally engaging science fiction books I've read in a long time.

"Warchild" confronts the reality of the damage done to the life of Jos, a nine year old boy who is abducted, enslaved and abused show more by the pirate who attacks his ship and kills his family.

The first section of the book is particularly hard on the emotions. Jos's description of his abduction and what happened during his enslavement is written in the second person, giving it a distant, disconnected feel, like someone reporting something that happened to someone else a long time ago. Here's an example, describing nine year old Jos' encounter with Falcone, the predatory Pirate Captain who has enslaved him

"He forced your chin back and looked at your throat, then he lifted your hands and inspected your fingers, your nails, your knuckles. Then he stepped back

'Take off your clothes.'

It was cold and you shook. You shook from more than cold. You couldn't move"

The distance amplifies the sense of helplessness, of wrongness and brutality in a way that breaks the heart and stokes impotent rage.

"Warchild" has an original plot and first class world-building. In any other book, I'd have been praising the clarity with which an interstellar war between Humans, Aliens and their Human Sypthatisers is described. I'd have placed front and centre how the similarities and differences between the alien culture and the human military culture are explored. Nothing more would have been needed to make this a good science fiction novel.

Karin Lowachee pushes herself to go further. She keeps the focus on Jos as he finds himself having to choose between two strong men, an Alien Commander and a Human Commander, each of whom seem to want something from him. Both men help him develop as a soldier. Each offers patronage and expects loyalty. Jos cannot bring himself completely to trust either man.

As events unfolded, I was shown that, beneath his shell of lethal competency, Jos is damaged: unable to sustain any kind of intimacy with his peers; unable to trust; deeply troubled by the things he refuses to let himself remember but which attack him through his dreams.

Jos becomes a soldier, regularly raiding ships, killing those who oppose him, capturing those who surrender, watching the people closest to him dying in battle. Jos does not get through this unscathed. He is finding it hard to hold on to who he is, to stay free of his past and of the pressures of his present.

Although the main body of the story is told in the first person, Karin Lowachee finds ways to reflect Jos' inner turmoil without using his interior monologue to do it. Perhaps the best example of this is the last chapter in Part IV of the book. Jos has been in a firefight in another ship and is returning to his ship "The Macedon" with blood on his hands and images of those he has killed fresh in his memory. In other dystopian novels, this might have been the moment when Jos comes of age and knows his purpose. This isn't that kind of novel. Karin Lowachee sums up Jos' mental state in a chapter that consists of a single sentence:

"I go back to Macedon with things in my head I have no language for. They are just hoarse sounds in a hollow drum of silence."

I was surprised to find that "Warchild" was Karin Lowachee's first novel, her writing is assured and skillful, managing to combine depth with brevity.

I was pleased to find that "Warchild" is the first book of a trilogy and that all three books are available. I look forward to reading the rest of them, although "Warchild" left me too emotionally frayed to move straight on to the next book. show less

This is probably my favourite book, and I almost couldn't get into it at first. In my case, perseverance was rewarded, and when I finished reading, I immediately read it again. You get more out of it the second time around. This is character-driven science fiction at its best. The aliens are believable, and have a solidly developed culture and language. They are 'other' enough to actually be aliens, not just humans in costume. The space pirates are based on real world villains, complete with show more their use of child slaves as soldiers. It's dark, and angsty, and the only book I've ever cried over. There is definitely a lot of suffering in this book, but there are also moments of light and humour that I appreciated so much more because of this. I'm willing to buy used copies for others if needed. This book, along with Burndive and Cagebird, definitely deserves more readers. show less

Sjenn is a member of the Aniw, a nation of hunter-gatherers that lives in the distant, icy North. She is also the ankago, or spirit walker, of her tribe: Through her Dog, the "little spirit" that lives in her body, she is able to communicate with her ancestors and relay their wisdom to her people. When she calls forth her Dog, her human body lies unconscious and unprotected, but her Dog form cannot be killed by human weapons. Because of this mysterious power, Sjenn is kidnapped by the show more Kabliw, a Southern race that has recently made contact with her people. General Fawle, a powerful military leader of the Kabliw, wants to learn more about Sjenn's power so that he can harness it for his own ends. But his son, Captain Jarrett Fawle, wants nothing to do with the Aniw woman or her mysterious powers, which seem to him like demon magic. Despite Jarrett's resistance, however, his fate soon becomes bound with Sjenn's, as the two of them try to unlock the secrets of her Dog without letting its power get into the wrong hands.

I bought this book when it first came out in 2010, largely because of the interesting premise and setting. The world of the novel is a pretty clear parallel to European colonization of the New World; indeed, Sjenn and her people are explicitly based on the Inuit nation. I also thought the system of magic sounded interesting and different from anything I'd seen before. The book moves at a glacial pace (no pun intended), but the writing is lovely and unique, so I didn't mind settling in for a slower read. I also found both Sjenn and Jarrett to be very interesting characters, although neither one was developed in a lot of depth. The book doesn't technically end on a cliffhanger, but there is definitely a lot more to the story. So I would be really interested to read a sequel…except that a sequel doesn't exist! Apparently the author didn't have a multi-book contract, and I guess her publisher decided to pull the plug after the first book was released. As a result, I'm incredibly frustrated, because I think this story had a lot of potential as a series! But unfortunately, I don't think the book stands very well on its own, so I'm not sure I would recommend it. show less

In 'The Gaslight Dogs', Karin Lowachee has built a powerful, convincing vision of a world in the throes of a familiar colonial conflict, has populated it with real people who have very little in common except their enforced servitude and then added an original, credible supernatural twist that gives the story its edge.

The first thing that hit me about 'The Gaslight Dogs' was the quality of the writing. Language here isn't a thin skin stretched over the bones of a clever plot, it's an show more invitation really to see the world that Karin Lowachee has created, to take in its sights and scents, its beauty and its ugliness with the fresh eyes and nose of a stranger. It's not language designed to get you to the next piece of dialogue or the next action scene as competently as possible. Nor is it purple prose of the over-long self-indulgent guitar solo kind. Its language that says: take the time to take in the place or you will not understand the journey.

This story is really two linked journeys, neither of which is voluntary and both of which are shaped by the obsession of a ruthless powerful old man with an insatiable hunger for conquest. We start with Sjennonirk, a young Aniwi spirit walker who is taken in chains from her home in the Arctic and brought south to a city built of brick and lit by gas, where high walls block off the view of the horizon in every direction. Then we meet a Captain Jarrett Fawle, a young man who, uncomfortable and unloved at home, only feels free when leading his men to hunt and kill the aboriginal tribes as part of the push to expand his country's territory. He is sent home on leave and kept there until he complies with his father's will. His father, General Fawle, is the man whose plan for power effectively enslaves both Sjennonirk and Captain Fawle. He sees them both as commodities to be exploited and makes their freedom conditional on meeting his goals.

It's easy to see 'The Gaslight Dogs' as a story about the ruthless use of technology by colonial powers to gain territory, to paint a picture of genocide and environmental destruction but I see it as more than that. This isn't a 'good guys stand up to bad guys' kind of story. Nor is it the Star Wars fantasy of brave rebels opposing an evil empire. The power of this story comes from its refusal to move to that Big Picture, Sweep Of History perspective. It stays focused on Sjennonirk and Captain Fawle and the choices that they make. Neither is a hero. Neither wants to be on the journey that General Fawle has sent them on. In their different ways, each just wants to go home. Each of them both representative of and outsiders to their own cultures. Their struggle is not primarily a clash of cultures but of two individuals pushing against their fate.

It seemed to me that a lot of this story was about the power of belief. Sjennonirk believes in the power of her ancestral spirits. She feels the little wolf inside her and knows its hunger. Her world view is one of respecting the spirits who, through her and spirit walker like her, protect her people. She is hungry for nothing more than to live at home in peace. She is passive, stoic and pragmatic, except when her wolf wakes. Captain Fawle is not a believer. He does not believe in the Seven Deities of his people, nor in the destiny of his country, nor in the possibility of being loved by his father. He fills the hole where his belief should be by winning the respect of his men when on the frontier and with alcohol when at home in the city.

When 'The Gaslight Dogs' was published in 2010, it was billed as the beginning of the 'Middle Light' series. It works well as a standalone book but I still holding out hope that Karin Lowachee will find the time to come back to this world. show less